Mayor holds off two challengers for second term

Runoff to decide 1 of 3 spots on Pine Bluff City Council

PINE BLUFF — In a mayoral campaign that was as much a referendum on the Go Forward Pine Bluff initiative as on the performance of the incumbent, Mayor Shirley Washington scored a decisive victory over her two opponents Tuesday.

When the final votes were announced late Tuesday at the Jefferson County Election Commission office, Washington had out-polled both of her challengers — Ward 3 Alderman Ivan Whitfield and Ward 4 Alderman Steven Mays — by a wide margin. There is no Republican candidate for the office, and Washington faces no other opponents.

The unofficial results in the Pine Bluff mayor’s race were:

Washington . . . . . . . . . . . 5,895

Whitfield . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1,179

Mays . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 711

Washington, 71, a retired school teacher and administrator, first ran for mayor in 2016, coming in second in a field of five candidates in the March 1, 2016, Democratic primary, then going on to defeat incumbent Mayor Debe Hollingsworth by a 731-vote margin out of 7,569 votes cast in a March 23, 2016, runoff election. She faced no opposition in the general election and, in January 2017, she was sworn in as the first black female mayor in the history of Pine Bluff.

Before her election as mayor, Washington became a supporter of Go Forward Pine Bluff, a public/private partnership working toward the revitalization of downtown Pine Bluff, and she ran on a platform of bringing investment back into the city.

Go Forward Pine Bluff, partially funded by a fiveeighths percent sales tax that was passed in a June 2017 special election, became an issue in the campaign this year, with both Whitfield and Mays running against it, saying the sales tax money should be applied elsewhere.

During the campaign, Washington touted among her accomplishments the reopening of Main Street, leadership in the negotiations that brought Saracen Casino Resort to Pine Bluff, a summer youth employment program, construction of 601 Main Street Plaza, and the purchase of the Plaza Hotel.

Whitfield, 58, a 35-year veteran and former chief of the Pine Bluff Police Department, was elected in 2018 to the Pine Bluff City Council to represent Ward 3.

In his mayoral bid, Whitfield pledged to work to enhance public safety, to introduce a citywide street and drainage rehabilitation program, to hire an economic specialist for the city, implement a youth initiative, and to begin a program to restore homes for ownership and to develop partnerships with educational institutions.

Whitfield has often been critical of the Go Forward Pine Bluff initiative, and has likened the 2017 sales tax that provides about $2.4 million a year to fund the initiative to a Jim Crow-era “poll tax,” accusing the architects of the funding mechanism of slipping it past the voters in a special election.

Last October, with support of five members of the eight-member council, he passed a resolution to redirect some $2.1 million a year from the five-eighths percent sales tax intended to fund the Go Forward initiative into city coffers instead to divert $1 million a year toward drainage improvements, and to divide the remainder between the police and fire departments, youth and community services, and the Pine Bluff Convention Center.

However, just two weeks later, the council passed an ordinance sponsored by Washington that returned the funding to Go Forward Pine Bluff, after three members flipped their votes in support, leaving only Mays and Whitfield as the two dissenting votes.

Mays, the senior member of the City Council now serving in his ninth year, said he has long harbored an ambition to be the mayor of Pine Bluff, and to that end, he pledged to listen to residents and to be mindful of their wishes.

Mays has also pledged to work to stabilize the population of Pine Bluff in an effort to reverse years of population losses as people have moved away from the Delta city to seek opportunities elsewhere.

Along with Whitfield, Mays has supported efforts to defund Go Forward Pine Bluff, and has even on numerous occasions called it a “scam” perpetuated upon the city.

Both Mays and Whitfield are in the second year of their four-year terms on the City Council.

The Pine Bluff mayor’s position pays $87,382 a year.

OTHER CITY RACES CITY COUNCIL WARD 1 POSITION 1

In the Ward 1 Position 1 council race, Lloyd Holcomb Jr., 44 — running against challengers Sam Whitfield, 64, and Garland Trice, 69 — avoided a runoff by garnering well over half of the votes cast. Both Whitfield and Trice were vocal opponents of Go Forward Pine Bluff as well.

The unofficial results were:

Holcomb Jr . . . . . . . . . . . . 1,257

Whitfield . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 358

Trice ................... 264

CITY COUNCIL WARD 2 POSITION 1

Lloyd Franklin II, 40, and Steven Shaner, 43, will face each other in a runoff on March 31 as the two top vote-getters in a three-way race that actually had four people on the ballot. George Stepps, 73, an accountant, came in third, despite having dropped out of the race a few weeks ago after informing the Jefferson County clerk’s office that he was to be appointed election coordinator by County Judge Gerald Robinson after the March 3 primary.

The unofficial results were:

Franklin II . . . . . . . . . . . . . 882

Shaner . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 814

Stepps . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 459

Albert King Jr . . . . . . . . . . 399

CITY COUNCIL WARD 3 POSITION 1

Glen Brown, 63, former Ward 3 alderman, scored a narrow victory over Donald Hatchett, 66, the incumbent, edging him out by just 36 votes in unofficial returns. Hatchett, a first-term alderman, defeated Brown in 2016 to win his seat on the council.

The unofficial results for the Ward 3 Position 1 race were:

Brown . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1,079

Hatchett . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1,043

A Pine Bluff alderman’s salary is listed at $13,080 annually.

PINE BLUFF CITY CLERK

Janice Roberts, 60, defeated Sharon Hardin Raspberry, 49, by a nearly 2-to-1 margin in unofficial results.

The unofficial results for the Pine Bluff city clerk race were:

Roberts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5,004

Raspberry . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2,521

The Pine Bluff city clerk’s position has an annual salary of $62,430.

PINE BLUFF TREASURER

Incumbent Treasurer Greg Gustek, 66, defeated Cynthia Mooney Sims, 58, to retain his position as Pine Bluff treasurer. The annual salary in that office is $9,860 a year.

The unofficial results for the Pine Bluff treasurer race were:

Gustek . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4,114

MooneySims ......... 3,404

No Republicans were entered in any of the city races, meaning those candidates who won their races outright and whoever wins their runoff race will be sworn in Jan. 1. All terms of office are four years.